Are there funnel web spiders in Ireland?

[BlackAmericanoNoSugar]

We were on holiday in Clare last week and DH’s Australian cousin said that he saw lots of webs of funnel web spiders in a densely wooded part of the garden. He got the heebie-jeebies and advised me to keep the kids out of the woods. But I assumed that they were just similar looking webs as I’ve never heard of a large infestation of exotic spiders.

Now I’m wondering if I was right. I probably should have had a good look and taken a photo but we were busy chasing some calves back into the adjacent field.

Probably a tube web or labyrinth spider.

Oh good. I was assuming that it would be too cold for Australian spiders to thrive and breed rapidly here.

I'm pretty sure funnel webs are only found in the Sydney area of Australia!

What Frankies said - we get loads of these labyrinth spider webs down in the SW (they like it up on the moors). No poisonous spiders here (I've read that there's the odd one capable of giving you a nip which might swell nastily, but that's as bad as it gets).